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A while ago, there was a guy called the pothole bandit, who would plant trees in the largest of pot holes as a protest. The city would have to go out to remove the tree and would often at least fill the pothole with dirt. I dug up one of the old articles about the pothole bandit. We all had some pretty good laughs about this. Maybe it is time for him to re-appear. The Bernie Sanders in this article is the same person as the well known Socialist Senator Bernie Sanders.

Burlington in Accord With Pothole Bandit
AP
Published: July 13, 1986

BURLINGTON, Vt., July 12— The Pothole Bandit and the City of Burlington have reached a truce in the bandit's war on potholes.

Mayor Bernard Sanders and the bandit, Bruce Ploof, 28 years old , celebrated a written agreement on Monday amid the din of jackhammers on the Winooski Bridge.

The agreement calls for the city to put more effort into its roads and for Mr. Ploof, a cab driver, to refrain from ''bandit activities.'' He had planted evergreen trees in city potholes to protest a lack of street repair.

Mayor Sanders and Burlington's public works commissioner, Sharon Bushor, took the occasion to announce a $1 million paving project. But Mr. Ploof said he was not through yet.

He said there were at least six other cities in the United States named Burlington where he might plant evergreens to highlight poor road conditions.

''I want to get a pardon in about six other states,'' Mr. Ploof said. ''I'm not done yet.''

I drive truck in the oil field, spend a lot of time on gravel roads and even off the road. Potholes are pretty much the name of the game so I've gotten very adept at avoiding them or even slowing down for the ones I can't avoid.

Some folks plant trees in the spring; others do it in the fall. Bruce Ploof had never planted trees before, so he took a middle-of-the-road approach.

He planted them in the middle of the road.

Ploof did this to protest the number of potholes in Burlington Vt., after an ambulance hit one and broke and axle. So, one Wednesday night in June, the 28-year-old taxi driver screwed up his courage and filled each of three of the city's biggest cavities with a 3-foot spruce.

He waited until the bars closed to plant the trees, and he placed a blinking light barricade in front of each one. Signs warned "Potholes of Burlington, Beware. (Signed) The Pothole Bandit."

The act put Burlington on the map. The New York Times ran the story, so did the Boston Globe, Washington Post, Stars and Stripes and the National Enquirer. Morton Dean mentioned The Great Pothole Caper on the Cable News Network, and a national gardening magazine took pictures.

Two days later, a Burlington disc jockey managed a telephone hookup between the still anonymous bandit and the local police chief. On the air, they decided to meet at Perkins Pier at High Noon, as the radio station played "The Good, The Bad, and They Ugly".
Bandit: "I'll come in from the East if you'll come in from the west."
Chief (protesting): That's Lake Champlian!"
Bandit: "That's OK, you guys just bought a new police boat."

The cops and cameras were waiting for Ploof, who entered with a John Wayne gait from across the railroad tracks. He wore a cowboy hat and sunglasses. A bandanna covered his face. What looked like a tree branch rose from the holster at his side.

The showdown turned out to be a letdown. Both sides agreed on needed road repair.

A week later, with newspapers in hot pursuit, Ploof acknowledged his identity on the Channel 3 news. He pulled off his mask after planting a tree in another pothole.

In July, the Pothole Bandit was back, this time to face the mayor. They met on the Winooski-Burlington Bridge, where Ploof received a written pardon and a cake to kick off the city's roads program. The cake was shaped like a street and had a center line down the middle sans potholes....

The publicity has been nice. "It taught me that people hate potholes and love trees."

Well, BGrass-Lers... this an example of the true American spirit. Stop and think about what you can do. In these days of lemming oriented politics, here is a man who found a way to not only raise local awareness but a way to do it with sttttttyyyyyyle.......